I have a bit of a jones for neurology, neuroscience and any other variation of suffix that tells me the exact composition of starch and electricity that bakes the noodle inside my head. So cue Developing Intelligence, an excellent neurology blog that recently posted about the influence of Video Games on mind development.

Look, I'm not going to lie to you: it's full of neurology jargon, interesting to those who are interested in it, excruciating to those who never will be. So summary: video games are good for your brain!

VGPs were also found capable of tracking two more objects on average than nVGPs in a multiple-object tracking task. Similar to the findings discussed above regarding nVGPs and VGPs, the differences only became apparent at levels of higher load, such that nVGPs showed larger performance decrements than VGPs.

As for the precise mechanism which is enhanced in VGPs, and which results in the benefits in the tasks reported above, the authors suggest two possibilities. First, it is possible that VGP's simply have more durable memory traces. A second possibility is that VGP's have an increased "cycle speed" (their words, not mine) with which they refresh existing representations in working memory, thus translating into increased memory capacity.

VGPs stands for 'video game players', natch. The games used were Medal of Honor and Tetris. Check it out, if you're so inclined. Florian Eckhardt

Video Games - Mental Exercise or Merely Brain Candy? [Developing Intelligence]